Invasion

The show was originally conceived by creator Shaun Cassidy to span five seasons, exploring humanity facing an unstoppable evolutionary change rather than a traditional alien invasion.

Shaun Cassidy has said that although Invasion was marketed as an alien invasion story, for him it was really about 'the invasion of a new father in my children's house' and the challenges of co-parenting after divorce, echoing themes from his earlier series American Gothic.

Due to Hurricane Katrina occurring in 2005, ABC quickly pulled early on-air promotions referencing the show's fictional hurricane and shifted advertising entirely to the alien invasion aspect, with the premiere preceded by a sensitivity warning about hurricane imagery.

Despite a strong premiere drawing 17 million viewers airing after Lost, ratings steadily declined to around 9 million by January 2006, and the show was cancelled after one season, later appearing on multiple 'cancelled too soon' lists.

William Fichtner was reportedly relieved when the show was cancelled, calling it 'a deliverance,' and stated the direction the writers took his character Sheriff Tom Underlay differed from what had originally been discussed with him.

Tyler Labine and Shaun Cassidy both attributed the cancellation to scheduling politics, noting the show aired right after Lost, which meant audiences were reluctant to follow two mythology-heavy serialized dramas at once.

Actor Tyler Labine and William Fichtner both revealed unaired future plotlines, including that Sheriff Tom Underlay's presumed-dead first wife, who survived the same 1996 plane crash as him, was secretly running a military operation as the true antagonist orchestrating events.

The show's orchestral score was performed by the Hollywood Studio Symphony Orchestra and composed by Jon Ehrlich and Jason Derlatka, who called Invasion one of their favorite projects; the soundtrack was released in 2008 with over 60 minutes of tracks.